The highest paying internships at investment banks in New York

Facing stiff competition from thriving tech companies, many investment banks have had to open up their purse strings to land top-level interns. This is particularly true in the U.S., where Silicon Valley looms large. Wall Street firms are paying a premium for interns this year.

An updated report from Wall Street Oasis shows the average intern salaries at the top ten investment banks in New York, including a breakdown between summer analysts and summer associates, the latter of whom are completing their MBA program rather than undergraduate studies. As you can see in the chart below, Citi tends to be the most generous with summer analysts, paying a prorated salary of $82k across a ten-week internship. That’s particularly impressive considering we’ve been told that salaries for summer analyst at investment banks top out at around $85k, similar to the ceiling at tech giants like Google and Facebook. Summer associates at Citi earn around $118k, just a bit north of the overall average.

One of the surprises on the list is Bank of America Merrill Lynch, which only pays summer analysts an average prorated salary of around $58k, roughly $14k below the median bank. BofA is also the second-lowest payer of MBA interns at $109k. BofA was at the very bottom of the top ten when we compiled this research last year. However, the biggest eye-opener is J.P. Morgan, which is tied for the second most generous bank when it comes to university students but pays MBA interns an average of just over $95k, by far the lowest figure among its rivals. While there are fewer data points with summer associates, the number doesn’t appear to be an anomaly when you look back at figures from previous years.

One note of possible interest: banks tend to advertise pay for summer analysts just as we have here, providing prorated annual salaries rather than breaking out a lump sum for the full 10 weeks. It’s a more impressive sounding number and acts as a good starting point for potential full-time offers. But when you break the numbers down, summer analysts at the top-paying New York bank will only make around $1.2k more after taxes over the ten weeks than the average intern. While that likely sounds like a lot of money to a student, it amounts to a drop in the bucket once their banking career gets started.

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